Organized Brownian Motion in Freestanding Graphene: A New Type of Thermal Motion

Conversion of omnipresent thermal motion into stored electrical charge has been achieved using vibration energy harvesting technology. Our studies demonstrate that the thermal movement of freestanding graphene produces an alternating electrical current when near a biased metal electrode. The magnitude of this induced electrical current is consistent with a constant-voltage, variable-capacitance power generator. The key mechanism behind this discovery is the spontaneous curvature inversion of ripples, during which thousands of atoms move coherently [PRL 117, 126801 (2016)]. The collective motion of the atoms is a many-body effect and represents a new type of thermal motion with long time correlations enabling energy extraction [PRL 71, 1477 (1993)]. Our results lay the groundwork for a new source of thermal power originating from organized Brownian motion. Circuit details and quantities of energy harvested from this new many-body thermal force will be highlighted in the presentation.